Timothy Donnelly has this poem--
totally switching gears-- has this poem called "Malamute,"
in The New Yorker.
And he did an interview with it--
about that poem-- and talked about how
the line happened for him.
And so this is definitely a poem after Timothy Donnelly,
thinking about a line that can kind of trigger a whole thing.
So it's lyric.
I have no idea what it's about, so don't ask me.
"Against Storm, Against Glib Thunder,
After Timothy Donnelly."
"When I was the red umbrella, her lover,
I made a precision of hoist.
We understood stairs, my girl.
We waited the hall, its curse, 'til
the sky undid clouds, uncoiled in loose slip of rain
and I waited for the first hushed sun to pattern
after a harp above her, a sure sign of song as tarp,
a sun against patter, against storm,
against glib thunder rumble, against chatter, we rubbed.
When I was the red umbrella, her lover,
I made a precision of hoist and sold metal as a system of limb,
as a static frigate to keep red gular pouch above her,
so she might know love as cover, such awkward inflation
and swarm below her that she might know the egg of warmth,
a nest of articulating spread.
Without rust.
Without the gait of heavy chest to lift her off in the sun.
When I was the red umbrella, her love,
I made a precision of hoist among her.
I stood down when she had an army of metals,
when she claimed command, armed with finches, mad with rain.
I would never invade any cover for shelter.
I never put her country at thirst.
I wanted to leave ranks loved, or wet,
depending on the map on which artillery she wanted posed.
I snapped, whenever.
Whenever she snapped.
When I was the red umbrella, her love,
I made a precision of hoist.
And got so good you couldn't see me erect.
Prone, I arched like the snake of a vine, the bank of a tree
limb.
I gathered moisture from air and I put buds
in her black wrath of hair.
I wanted all bees to swim us, roped
through breeze, our spiny ribs licked into a sway of combs
they stung to.
I wanted us open.
So she could see my drapes."